Threshold Theater: Queer Storytelling for All of Us

“If I were to put on my big boy director glasses and give you the most, like, highfaluting answer, I’d probably say it’s human.”

Denzel Belin is sitting across from me at a table at Queermunity, explaining the tone of “Spellbound,” a new play he is directing for Threshold Theater. “Spellbound” is special not only because the project has been in development since 2019 (yet another timeline interrupted by the pandemic) but also because it marks Threshold Theater’s first full-length production. This dramatic comedy hinges on the moment when a man uses a love potion on one of his best friends — who happens to be a happily married, expectant father.

Matthew Everett, Threshold’s literary director and the playwright behind “Spellbound,” sits next to Belin nodding enthusiastically. “On the front page of the script it says a romantic comedy-drama about love and consent,” Everett says.

“When you think of comedy, drama, love, consent,” Belin says, “Those are four vastly different words … there are moments in this play that are going to make you laugh really hard, where you’re going to fall in love, sit with the tension [and] … want to slap someone.”

“I like to say that it’s funny up until the point where it isn’t anymore,” Everett says.

“Spellbound” grapples with some heady themes and centers queer people, but its aim is to show queer people living normal lives. It’s just that in this case, their “normal lives” include a dash of magic.

“It’s so important to show the fullness of [living] as a queer person during these times because we’re constantly being reduced to headlines,” Belin explains. “… This play is just people who are queer and who are not queer, living their messy lives joyously.”

Bringing the right actors in to tell this story was a priority. “As a company, Threshold is committed to diverse casting,” Everett says. “We’re not just presenting queer stories — we’re presenting an array of different kinds of people and different types of actors.”

Belin nods. “I read an article in college that talks about the idea of moving away from ‘blank blind casting’ … to ‘blank conscious casting,’” he says. “So, color blind, gender blind to [color and gender] conscious casting … I love to bring in an actor and see how that character is through them as opposed to forcing the character on to an actor that I could cast.”

Belin and Everett are both cerebral, enthusiastic artists and both are busy. Belin works with Brave New Workshop, Minnesota Leather Pride and Twin Cities Spectrum, and puts a huge priority on balancing his love of life with his desire to make an impact. “I like to stay busy in a conscious way,” he explains. “I like to engage within my communities and do activism work, but also bring in that joy, which is a kind of activism in itself.”

Most of Everett’s creative work is tied up in Threshold these days. He is Threshold’s Literary Director, his play “Spellbound” is being produced through Threshold, and he coordinates a yearly playwriting challenge. The Threshold Theater Writing Challenge was inspired by Red Theater in Chicago and brings us full circle in a very satisfying way: Red Theater’s playwriting challenge provided the seed that grew into “Spellbound.”

“The challenge that day was [to] write a scene in which magic is real,” Everett says. With this in mind, Everett built a story in which a man plays around with a love potion, accidentally doses his best friend, and finds himself “horrified by the consent issues involved and basically trying very hard not to let [his friend, who is married with a baby on the way] do something that he’s going to regret later.”

The Threshold Theater Writing Challenge offers writers the same opportunity to create something amazing.

“We have writers who come back year after year because they say it’s their most productive month,” Everett says.

Writers have submitted 10-minute plays, one acts, won competitions and are getting their works produced.

Being a playwright himself, Everett is all too familiar with the difficulty that playwrights face in trying to get their work produced.

“It’s hard being a playwright,” Everett says. “Theaters can’t work with a dead actor, but they can work with a dead playwright and many theaters prefer that. Playwrights are competing with everyone who’s ever written.”

This understanding lends Everett a distinct sensitivity to writers who submit to Threshold. It is also part of what drew him to Threshold in the first place: Threshold only produces new works centering LGBTQ+ voices.

“[Prioritizing new work is how] we keep stories relevant, the way we keep adding to the cannon,” Belin says.

When James Zappa, Nick Mrozek and David Schlosser first imagined Threshold Theater back in 2019, they hoped to prioritize locally written works. Quickly, however, they realized that opening submissions up further would increase their ability to showcase those fresh voices telling intersectional LGBTQ+ stories.

“[We asked ourselves], are we telling trans stories, are we telling stories by asexual writers, bisexual writers, gay, lesbian? There have been historical [stories], comedies, dramas, sci-fi, horror,” Everett says.

Submissions have steadily increased ever since.

“We have that embarrassment of riches in terms of options,” Everett explains. “I wish that there were 10 or 15 Threshold Theaters that could produce all of these writers all at once. There is so much out there.”

Threshold Theater also hosts play readings throughout the year.

“We started a partnership with the Black Hart of St. Paul to start doing in-person readings,” Everett says. “They’ve got a little back lounge there so we’ve been partnering with them ever since we started doing in-person readings again.”

Threshold offers a lot to creatives.

“I find myself drawn back to Threshold time and time again [because] it’s a community space,” Belin says. “… There are writers who Threshold has worked with time and time again, people audition for Threshold productions because they read Threshold’s mission and values and they like that.”

There are so many ways to support Threshold Theater and its mission. Attend a reading at Black Hart, join the writing challenge this November, and see “Spellbound” at Phoenix Theater this month. Performances run from Friday, April 18 through Saturday, May 3, and tickets are sold on a sliding scale from $10 to $25.

If you have been looking for a way to support and enjoy modern, queer storytelling, Threshold Theater is a great place to start.

thresholdtheatermpls.com